


Out Of (this) Place

by crabapplered



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-07
Updated: 2019-08-07
Packaged: 2020-08-12 03:44:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20147941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crabapplered/pseuds/crabapplered
Summary: Prompto helps a blind man retrieve a friend from the depths of the Rude Moogle Arcade. That's when the shooting starts.





	Out Of (this) Place

**Author's Note:**

> Enormous thanks to everyone in the chat for their tireless encouragement, and especially to Sei, who beta'd this monster

There's a blind guy standing outside the Rude Moogle arcade.

_Correction_, thinks Prompto, taking in the broad shoulders, the long legs, the fine-boned features picked out in scarlet by the light of the arcade's vulgar neon sign. _There is a_ really hot _blind guy standing outside the arcade, and wow, he could_ not _be any more outta place, huh?_

Because this is 23rd and Kinneas, with its cracked sidewalks and garbage-choked alleys, its flickering neon and grated shop windows. The pizza place two blocks down has been robbed so often they take your order from behind bulletproof glass. The tattoo joint next to the arcade specializes in gang sigils, and if you're carded at the local bar they'll accept a two star Triple Triad as valid ID.

So this blind guy, with his immaculate black jeans and his silky black button-down, his polished dress shoes and his perfectly coiffed hair - he isn't just out of place. He's out of this entire space-time continuum.

He's also clearly having problems. He gives up on calling whoever on his smartphone, and instead turns toward the gaping maw of the arcade and frowns, fingering his cane. He takes a single step forward. Stops. Prompto can see the man's hands tighten on his cane and phone.

He's wearing black leather gloves. Prompto imagines he'd be able to hear them creak if it wasn't for the arcade vomiting noise into the narrow street and, oh, it's probably way overwhelming for a blind guy, right?

It's overwhelming for Prompto, too. That's the whole point of coming here: to drown out sight-sound-thought-_smell_ in a rancid pit of fake violence and tinned screams, buying a few hours peace from the knowledge of what he is (human) and what he isn't (_human_).

But now, faced with this guy who's blind and vulnerable, Prompto can't help but feel the unbreakable chain of kinship.

_Is this what they call the 'human connection'?_

Whatever it is, it's tugging him forward from where he's been lurking by the corpse of a car, abandoned at the curb for its overdue parking tickets and gutted by the locals for anything pawnable. It pulls him across the road and through the muddy puddle of light from the busted up street lamp, reels in him until he's close enough to see himself reflected in the blind man's mirrored shades.

"H-hi?" The howl of the arcade drowns out his voice. He tries again, shoving the words out in jagged chunks past the embarrassment knotted in his throat. "Uh, hello!? Mister Blind Guy!? Do you- do you need, um, help!?"

Social interaction! Who knows how it works? Not Prompto! He's obviously made a complete ass of himself here, what with how the blind guy first goes really still, then slowly cocks his head to the side, and now his entire attention is on Prompto, heavy with the weight of expectations that Prompto is just not strong enough to bear.

His blurts his surrender out in a garbled mangle of, "Not that I think you aren't a totally capable and independent person who can obviously take care of his own needs and I'm sorry I assumed and I probably shouldn't call you blind because it's visually impaired now, right? Oh gods, I'm so sorry-" They say blind people have sharper senses. Right now the blind guy's nose must be filled with the stink of _pathetic loser_. "I'm really- I'll just . . . go . . ."

"Please don't," says the hot blind guy and his voice is sexy, and he has an accent, and the _accent_ is sexy, and ugh, Prompto will never be able to set foot in front of this arcade again without remembering how he made an idiot of himself.  
  
Then the words register.

"Oh. You- you want help?"

"Indeed. I fear my friend has lost track of time in the arcade again." Somehow the answer is perfectly audible over the clatter of pinball machines, the electric wail of video game sirens, and how is this guy doing it? "Unfortunately, I'm not equipped to go in after him. If you'd be so kind as to carry a message?"

The guy's half-smile is warm, but the tilt of his head makes the Prompto reflected in those mirror shades melt and warp until he hemorrhages red neon. The streetlight throbs. Shadows drag their hands across the blind man's handsome face and leave fingerprints behind, black smudges along his cheekbones, in the bow of his pouty lips, the dip of his temples, the ragged scars seeping from under his mirrored shades. For a heartbeat it's like he's crying black tears.

Prompto drops his gaze. He doesn't want to see this.

There's too much of a chance it's real.

Instead he focuses on the way the guy's long fingers relax on the black and silver guide cane when Prompto says, "Sure. I'd be happy to take a message. Who'm I looking for?"

At least Prompto's habit of seeing too much will be useful, for once.

"Thank you so much. He's a young man, about- no, wait. I've a better idea." The guy leans his cane against the wall, then taps at his phone a moment before turning the screen toward Prompto. "I'm fairly sure the background is still as he left it. It should be a picture of a young man, dark hair, blue eyes?"

"Uhhhh. Y-yeah."

It's a picture of a young guy and, okay, so the blind guy is hot, but this dude on the phone is _beautiful_. Incredibly, unfairly so, enough that the duck face he's making at the camera looks properly pouty instead of teen-awkward. Who has skin that perfectly pale? What the hell are those incredible blue eyes?!

"Wow," he blurts, and then immediately tries to swallow his own tongue in a desperate suicide attempt to escape from the disaster of himself.

Amazingly, the blind guy doesn't flinch in disgust at this inappropriate perving on his friend. Instead his whole face does this . . . this softening thing, making him look younger and sweeter, and his mouth curls into a half-smile that's all the nicer because of the little scar on his lips. "Indeed."

This guy isn't human, Prompto is more sure of it with every breath the man fails to take, but he used to be. Part of him still is, to make his voice so warm and gentle like that.

He's . . . Prompto gropes for the words. This guy is a _person_.

You don't have to be a human to be a person, right?

_Six, I hope so._

(because what does it mean for Prompto if-)

"His name is Noctis, and he's probably in the back, hammering at the Justice Monster V machines." The blind guy's voice turns dry. "He's trying to beat his high score and get that platinum bangle, I'd imagine." He sighs. "Why he bothers when we can just buy one . . ."

"Dude, no! It's _totally_ not the same! Winning it makes it proof of your mad skillz, and it's _especially_ badass when it's from something like Justice Monsters V. You know, a lot of people think that you can get away with mashing the buttons, but you actually have to calculate the angles and the timing on the fly, which is rough with the randomization of the bumper collision, and there's all this strategy in picking the right fighter and swapping them back and forth so they have time to regenerate HP, and mastering the occasional hip check which is _not_ cheating, okay, they calibrate the machine for it, and- and, uh . . ." His words come to a stumbling halt, tripping over the speed bump of the blind guy's raised eyebrow.

"I'm going to lose you in there, too, aren't I?"

"No!" squeaks Prompto. "No, I swear, I can do this! I will do this! Right now! And I'll be right back! Promise," he says, taking two steps backward before spinning on his heel to march into the glittering black guts of the arcade.

It swallows him down into the dry, suffocating warmth of too many electronics in too small of a space. The air stinks of stale popcorn, spilt soda, sweat, and Prompto's own regret.

YOU LOSE oozes across the screen of Slaughter Zombie, and Prompto feels that this is probably true. For all his brave words to the blind guy outside there's a very good chance that Prompto is on the way to crushing failure.

The thing is. The thing is, even if he's seen this Noctis' guy's picture, there's no guarantee he'll look like that in person.

Not to Prompto, who sees everything reflected in a splintered mirror, image on image on image of the same thing - except where the glass rests just so and he can see _through_ it to the things _behind_.

And not in this arcade, where the flickering lights spell out S.O.S. in desperate yellow and green telegraph code, where a half dozen kids committed suicide as YOU ARE DEAD seared its letters into their brains, where it doesn't matter what you are because you can't be more alien than the too-soft carpet that throbs under your shoes in stuttering heartbeat.

People come to the Rude Moogle to drown in the shadows of something vast. To become anonymous in the darkness. To be _erased_.

_So doesn't that mean this 'Noctis' is here because he doesn't want be found?_

Prompto's skin prickles, his stomach roils. This is definitely something he should have thought of before agreeing to the blind guy's request.

_Dammit, Brain, aren't we supposed to have an understanding about stuff like this? I keep us fed, you keep us from agreeing to stupid ideas. But because_ you_ couldn't keep up your end of the deal now we're stuck poking around in here seeing everything we try and ignore._

He's tempted for all of a second to turn around and go back to the blind guy, tell him . . . what? That the depths of an arcade contains things Man Was Not Meant To Know?

What if he thinks Prompto is lying?

Or worse, what if he thinks Prompto is telling the truth? Would he be upset? Would he try and come in to save his friend? Would he go get the cops? Would he ask questions about how Prompto even knows?! Questions that, let's be real, Prompto can't answer because he doesn't know.

(he knows. he just doesn't _know_.)

Better to avoid the whole mess.

"Justice Monsters V, Justice Monsters V," he chants under his breath. His gaze scans the odd geometry of dark and light, flickering colours drawing suggestions of nightmare landscapes on the wall. The game consoles tend to stay in the same place, but the pathways can shift around. "Make it easy to find so I can get out alive."

A familiar chiptune jingle answers him, bright notes stabbing through the auditory chaos of victory bings! and swearing, the click of old buttons and the bzzzt! of loses. Prompto finds himself following his ears instead of his eyes, and isn't that ironic? Maybe the blind guy would have been okay in here after all.

A long walk. A few turns. At one point he has to squeeze between two machines set not quite back to back. He comes out the other side with cobwebs in his mouth and the distinct suspicion someone groped his ass. That's okay, though, because before him is the trio of Justice Monster V machines and there's someone standing at the middle one, hunched over and slamming on the levers, leaning into every swoop and bounce that Lamiana makes as she rockets around the screen.

"C'mon, c'mon! Charge faster!"

Dark hair. Husky voice. Totally into Justice Monsters. This seems to be the guy.

Still. In a place like this? Best to be sure before calling attention to himself.

Prompto edges forward carefully, slipping along the sides of this liminal space, pushing through the thick syrup of shadows until he's got a clear view of the guy's profile and oh. Gods.

He really is as beautiful as his photo.

"That is _so_ unfair," groans Prompto.

Too loud.

"Huh?" The guy —Noctis'?— head comes up and Prompto finds himself suddenly pinned in place by that incredible gaze, deep blue and glowing like shards of crystal meteorite, and just as alien.

Of course a not-human blind person would have a not-human friend. He hasn't ripped out Prompto's kidneys yet, though! So before this dude can change his mind Prompto blurts, "Are you Noctis?"

". . . uh. Yeah?"

On screen, Lamiana crashes and burns. DEFEATED.

Noctis stares at the word. Blank face, vacant eyes. He stands there, and keeps standing there, motionless, even when the machine spits out its prize capsule, and so finally Prompto comes over to join him.

Ninety seven chests, Prompto notes. He picks up the plastic egg and cracks it open, spilling the emerald bracelet into his palm. "Well. Better than your last time, right?"

Noctis' tone is pleasant, conversational: "I'm gonna kill you."

"Yeah, I'd kill me, too."

They stand there a bit longer, Prompto playing with the bracelet and enjoying how it sucks in multicoloured light and spits it back out as green, and green, and green, all over his palms.

"This thing is really pretty. No way I'd have managed to win something this nice. Can I be buried with it?"

"Sure," says Noctis, because he's apparently a stand-up guy for a non-human whatever.

"Cool. After you're done murdering me, be sure to go out and meet your blind friend, okay?"

"Blind- wait, you mean Ignis?" Life returns to Noctis with a full body twitch, unseen puppet strings bringing him back into motion. "Is Ignis out there?"

"Uhhh. I never got his name. He's about six feet tall, all in black, sexy accent, looks like he stepped off the cover of Business Babes Monthly?"

Noctis' mouth twitches up at one end. "Yeah, that's Ignis." Then he. Well. He looks mildly irritated? He doesn't seem to be the emoting type. "What's he doing here? He should be back at the motel. It's not safe-" he cuts himself off and sighs. "Whatever. Guess I'd better go see. C'mon, let's get out of here."

_Let's? As in, 'Let us'? Since when are we an us?_ "Getting out of here might be a bit tricky," Prompto offers, scrambling for a graceful way to escape this sudden unwanted bit of camaraderie.

"Pffft. Whatever." Noctis props a fist on his hip and looks out into the vague suggestion of existence beyond the shadows. "Hey. Move it or lose it."

And the Rude Moogle _changes_.

Video arcade machines spring to life, their flashing screens illuminating a path in pulsing bursts of light. A long ribbon of space that stretches out before Prompto and Noctis clear through to a pale grey rectangle hanging the distance, framed with strings of fairy lights and crowned with a scarlet EXIT sign.

It's the most frightening thing Prompto has ever seen.

No one should be able to order the Rude Moogle around. _No one_. The place is- it doesn't listen to the laws of physics, so why should it listen to a person, and what kind of _power_\- what-

Prompto marches along beside Noctis and tries very hard not to focus on the fact that every arcade screen they pass becomes a splattered mess of 8bit blood decals.

Hey, maybe it's a good thing! What if Noctis is, like, a vampire? Blood decals would be good things then, right? "Are you a vampire?"

Noctis trips over air, almost staggering into one of the machines. Prompto grabs him by the hand and hauls him back, stammering apologies, terrified that if given the chance the Rude Moogle will swallow Noctis up and leave Prompto alone to face this endless parade of digital gore and, at the end, Ignis' disappointment.

Prompto can almost hear him. That lovely voice bloated with disappointment: 'What do you mean, you lost my friend in the interdimensional space of the arcade?'

Nope, not having that conversation. Way better to get a little handsy, even if it is with a- "So, that's a yes?"

Noctis is still and quiet in the dark, his cold, dead hand in Prompto's, his cold, blue-star gaze digging into Prompto's, and he says, "Yeah. I mean, yes. I'm a vampire."

"Okay," says Prompto, "Cool. Let's get out of here and meet your buddy Ignis so you can go do vampire things and I can go find a Crow's Nest and cry into a milkshake for a few hours. If, you know, you don't kill me for figuring out your dark secret."

Noctis laughs and squeezes Promto's hand before gently pulling away. "Don't worry, you're safe. I don't believe in killing the messenger."

"Oh good." His hand still tingles with cold after Noctis' touch, a bit like it'd been dunked in mint-fresh mouthwash. _I wonder what a vampire's dental routine is like. They must go through so many toothbrushes._

He keeps his own teeth locked firmly around that little observation. Just because Noctis is in a good mood now doesn't mean he can't be pushed into bad temper.

_Wild animal rules, Prompto! Move slow, don't turn your back, make yourself look bigger. No, wait, scratch that, make yourself look small and not tasty. And be really, really,_ really_ polite._

With that in mind he trails behind Noct the last bit of the way, trying to keep a respectful distance without lagging so far that he's likely to get left behind and swallowed up. The Rude Moogle seems happy to see him go, his return to the outside world marked by a firm shove between his shoulders, invisible hands making clear that Prompto is to get out, and the curtain of darkness that falls as every light in the place extinguishes making it clear that Prompto is to _stay_ out.

That's okay. Prompto has already decided to never come here again. Considering the nature of the place it's very likely the Rude Moogle holds grudges, and Prompto doesn't want to pay for Noctis' attitude.

Noctis himself was obviously spared the manhandling. He's hurrying over to the blind guy --to Ignis-- and saying, "Specs? What are you doing here? How did you even _get_ here? And where's Gladio?"

"I'm here to fetch you, of course, since Gladio has gone out. _Again_. And as for how I arrived, I walked. My legs _do_ still work even if the rest of me is damaged," replies Ignis in words with all the edges still on.

"No, that- that's not what I meant! It's just that it's dangerous for you- for any of us- you said so yourself-" Noctis glances back over his shoulder at Prompto.

It gives Prompto a clear view of the helpless pleading on Noctis' face, an expression all too familiar to someone who's dug himself into more pits than he can count with his own clumsy words. This is a guy who's desperate for a social save.

It also gives Prompto a clear view when the hellish red zit of a laser sight pops into life right between Noctis' eyebrows.

Prompto's moving. Propelled by a hundred thousand action movie fantasies about being the hero, he jerks forward, hands slamming into Noctis' shoulders and sending him stagging back into his friend. They totter a moment. An eternity. Shrapnel hangs in the air around them, the Rude Moogle bleeding cement in white spurts.

Then Prompto hears the gunshot.

"_Down!_" snaps Ignis, and Prompto drops to his belly, thankful for the endless push-ups that let him catch himself before his chin cracks on the asphalt. "We need cover!"

"Wrecked car, eleven o'clock!" says Noctis, and the three of them scramble like roaches as gunshots batter down on them like hail, Prompto turning to help Noctis half-carry Ignis into the dubious protection of the wreck.

The three of them huddle together as bullets ricochet off rusted metal.

Prompto, high on adrenaline and the blissful certainty that he'll be dead in a few seconds, dares to say, "You know, I'm kinda jealous. I never get rescued from social disaster by sniper attacks."

"I'm all about that silver lining," says Noctis, flashing him a quick grin. Then he pulls out his phone out, announcing, "I'm phoning Gladio."

The last remaining car window shatters in a slurry of glass. "Be my guest," snaps Ignis. "I suspect you will find, however, that you will be immediately shunted to voicemail, the battery of his phone having likely died after yesterday's King's Knight marathon!"

The unvoiced 'I told you so' is so powerful that it seems even the shooters feel the stab of second hand embarrassment, their gunfire pausing to let Ignis' irritation take centre stage.

Into that silence Noctis grumbles, ". . . what kind of hotel doesn't have an in-room charger, anyway?"

"Ones that take cash and not names. It's been fifteen seconds, Noct. They've likely decided to reposition. We've got to get out of here before they can make it to the street."

Noctis is instantly cramming his phone back into his pocket. "Shit. Not good."

The hairs on the back of Prompto's neck stand on end. "What d'you mean, 'not good'," he demands. "It's just dudes with guns, right? You're a vampire! A creature of the night, a scourge on the living! Can't you just, you know," he wiggles his fingers, "mind whammy them? Make them obey like you did with the arcade?"

Noctis shakes his head. "The arcade is possessed. These guys are. . . they're basically meat puppets. Empty. I can't work with nothing."

"As for the danger of the guns, the ammunition they're using is hollow point," says Ignis, holding up the iron flower of a spent bullet. "It won't kill Noctis, but it can cause enough damage to force him into torpor. And it will absolutely puree a mortal like you," he adds, almost cheerfully. "Should cave your face right in."

Prompto swallows thickly. "Oh. Um, what about you?"

"I honestly have no idea and I don't wish to find out. That's why we're going to steal a car. I assume there are some functional ones in this neighbourhood?"

"None on this street," says Noctis.

"Nobody parks around here if they can help it," Prompto tells them. "But there's a laundromat parking lot about two blocks away. There's usually something there, but there might be people."

Ignis folds his cane into quarters with a few quick snaps, then tucks it into his back pocket. "We'll risk it. The gunfire will have hopefully driven everyone off. Noct, you guard our backs. If you see any of the ghouls, never mind the need for secrecy: light them up. Meanwhile, you, mortal. Take my hand."

Prompto obediently grabs hold, and shivers at the strength of Ignis' long fingers as they wrap around him, the buttery-soft black leather of the glove a poor veil to the raw power beneath.

"When I give the signal, you start running toward that parking lot. Don't worry about me keeping up. As long as you don't run me into any walls and let me know if there's a step coming, I'll be fine. And if I'm not fine, then you can leave me behind," Ignis finishes, bulldozing over Noctis' protesting, "Ignis!"

Noctis' glare is like a dagger of ice at Prompto's throat. It doesn't take any kind of lipreading skill to understand the mouthed, 'Don't you fucking dare.'

"Right. I am so~o ignoring that part about leaving you behind," says Prompto. "We ready?"

Noctis gifts him with an approving grin, wild and sharp and glittering in the poor light. "I'm good."

". . . very well," Ignis sighs. He folds his legs beneath him in a crouch, knees scattering the broken glass. Adjusts his grip on Prompto's hand. "On three. One. Two. Three-"

They run.

Hand in hand with a stranger, Prompto breaks cover and sprints down the cracked pavement, his shadow skittering ahead of him like a frantic cat. For a brief eternity the only sound is the rapid beat of footsteps and his own gasping breath.

The back of Prompto's neck tingles.

He jerks to one side and takes Ignis with him. This time it's not a rain of bullets but a single shot with the fury of a lightning bolt - the street where Ignis would have been is suddenly pitted by a hole as wide as Prompto's hand and twice as deep.

"They left that sniper behind!" yells Noctis.

"I can distract-" Ignis tries to pull out of Prompto's hold, but the memory of white fangs and blue eyes makes Prompto tighten his grip, yelling,

"It's cool, I got this!"

It's a lie, it's a _lie_, but the only way Prompto is surviving tonight is with Ignis beside him, so Prompto will _make_ it the truth. Even though he's always seen, he's tried not to look. Tonight that's gonna change.

His gaze flashes along the path ahead. The tall, narrow windows of Money Tree Loans spill stripes of pale white light onto the sidewalk. To Prompto's eyes it looks like a crosswalk and so it is one. He steps onto it and drags Ignis with him and for ten steps they flash in and out of here and there. They hit solid ground on the other side and there's a crack like a dotted line that leads across the street and into shadows that Prompto follows, deeper and deeper into darkness, into the black space that festers along the rotting flanks of a pair of apartment buildings.

They surface from that dark ocean, stumbling onto the shore of sidewalk and dripping shadow from their fingertips, leaving sticky-tar footprints behind them, an arrow to point the sniper right to them, so Prompto takes a risk and drags Ignis past the Gil-do Sex Shop and smacks the store window, jostling the neon sign.

White light erupts in lurid spurts.

"Fuck," gasps Noctis. Then, "I'm _fine_, keep going, Specs!"

"But-"

Prompto risks a glance behind him. "He's okay, he's not bleeding, the sniper is still there, please keep running, please, please, turn here, stop! Good, okay, keep going! Trash everywhere but we can slow down a bit!"

They've made it to the narrow alley bridging this road to the next block, where the walls are padded an extra inch by the soggy corpses of posters and paper ads, where the ground is a minefield of garbage and sewage and trash. Prompto leads them through it in an awkward waltz, set to the music of his babbling directions: "Cardboard boxes go left, pothole—oh gods that's gross what is that—around these dumpsters, no not there, trash bags, come over here-"

Ignis is a lousy dance partner, resisting Prompto's directions and trying to twist around, reaching his free hand out to see the only way he can. "Noct-!"

"-keep moving please, he's fine (I hope) it was just a neon sign and it's sunlight that gets vampires, right, so he's okay, also there's a busted fire escape ladder careful, duck down a bit, okay we're almost through-"

Noctis is scrubbing at his watering eyes as he stumbles in drunken arcs behind them. He bumps into the ladder's rusting corpse but manages to keep his feet. Finally reaches out and gives Ignis' hand a squeeze. "He's right, it's just dazzle from a flare. My eyes are clearing already."

The sudden, painful clutch of Ignis' fingers on Prompto's jerks his attention back and that's when he really _sees_ Ignis' face for the first time, beautiful and ravaged and _on fucking fire_. Blazing from his eyes in great twisting tongues of blue and lavender, sparks dripping down his cheeks in a parody of tears.

"D-does it still hurt?" he stammers. Wants to reach out and smother the flames with his own palms.

"No," says Noctis. Noctis, and not Ignis, because the flames are real (probably) but not actually going on in this place and time, and neither of them knows what Prompto can see. "'m okay now. We almost there?"

"We have to be," says Ignis. "They're catching up."

Prompto takes his word for it. Rips his attention away from the dancing pyre of Ignis' gaze and back to where it should be, on getting them out and away. "Out this alley and across the street and we're there. Beer bottles on your right, whoops, needles, watch out-"

They surge from the depths of the alley to stumble onto sidewalk pavement littered with abandoned cigarettes, a half-eaten Cup Noodles, broken glass, someone's shoe. The parking lot lies across the road like an expanse of virgin field, the trio of cars in it like fat garulas waiting for slaughter.

The blue one is an ugly block of metal but Prompto can see it's been cared for and well fed, its tank full of gas, its tires thick and healthy.

He blinks and it's just a beat up car.

Ignis begins, "We need-"

"Way ahead of you," says Prompto, steering them toward his big blue target at a dead run. "But I hope you know what to do when we get there because I do-ooooh _shit!_ Ow! My ear!" He slaps a hand to his head and feels the wetness, warm and sticky, stumbles and has to be steadied by Ignis when the realization hits. "I've- I've been shot? I've been shot!"

"You'll be shot more if you don't run," Ignis snaps. He drops Prompto's hand to grab him by the arm instead and uses the hold to fling him back into motion. "Get me to the driver's side door. Noct?"

Noctis has stopped and is turning, his hand raised. "I'm on it!"

They leave him behind as gun fire cracks in vicious bursts of sound. Two-three-five shots, two more, and with every one Prompto flinches, trips, has to fight his own body to keep moving, has to fight not to look back when the screaming starts.

_Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck-_

That sound is not human. That sound is not 'person'. It is all 'thing', a high wail that claws at the edges of reality and draws blood. It rises into a thready screech, is joined by a second voice, an alien dissonance playing between them that makes the world waver before Prompto's eyes as tears well up and spill down his cheeks.

He swerves drunkenly the last few steps to the car. Slams into the side of it and clings to the metal shell. There is no gunfire anymore, just the screaming, and he's got goosebumps from it so bad it hurts, like his skin is trying to rip itself off his bones and slink away.

He slaps the roof and manages to croak out a triumphant, "Car. Door," he adds, taking Ignis' hand and pressing it to the driver's window.

And, okay, Prompto's expecting Ignis to fiddle with the lock, right? A quick jimmy like in the movies, something to give Prompto time to catch his breath and scrub the water from his eyes but no. Ignis just draws his arm back and _punches through the window_.

Glass everywhere, like blue-green confetti for the worst party ever.

"Uh," says Prompto.

Ignis gropes at the door frame, pops the lock with one hand and jerks the handle with the other. The door swings open and Prompto finds himself being stuffed into the bucket seat.

"Uh?" says Prompto.

"I'm _blind_." Ignis slams the door shut and then plants a hand on the hood of the car and vaults over it because apparently he's not only the world's sexiest accountant he's also its most athletic. He raps the passenger window with his knuckles. "Unlock this." And when Prompto stays still, staring at him, "Hurry! Noctis can only set so many people on fire before we attract worse things than a few shooters!"

Worse. Sweet Astrals there's worse. Prompto scrambles to open the door for Ignis, practically hauls him into the passenger seat. "Are you gonna hotwire-"

Ignis bats away Prompto's hands. He slams his door shut and then reaches into the nothing between worlds and from that darkness he pulls a shimmering dagger of steel and blue magic, with a blade as long as his forearm and the cruel slenderness of an icepick. His free hand swings through space to grab the steering wheel, then skids down to the column and finds the ignition.

Then he stabs it. Screw subtlety, right? They're in a hurry.

A vicious twist of his wrist and then he yanks the blade out and scrapes out the shattered remnants of the lock. A second stab, another twist and-

-and the car starts.

"How does that even work?!" Prompto squawks.

"Electrical current," says Ignis as if that actually explains anything. He leans over Prompto, too close and too warm and smelling of juniper cologne (he even smells sexy and sophisticated but it's all a goddamn lie, he's _brutal_) and bellows out the window, "_Noct!_ We're ready!"

Close at this awkward angle, Prompto can see around the mirrored shades to the ruin of Ignis' face, the embers of pain still glowing hot in the ashy scar splashed across the man's left eye. They flash and flare, dripping purple sparks of the unearthly fire Prompto glimpsed before, their light gilding the ridges of seared flesh so Prompto can read the words carved there:

-it was worth it, it was all worth it, always worth it, i would do it again, i will do it again, it was worth it-

An endlessly looping oath of sacrifice. Intense and honest and _private_, something no one (certainly not Prompto, especially not Prompto) was meant to see, so he tears his gaze away to glance in the rear view mirror just in time to watch Noctis rip through the fabric of existence, crawling out of the yawning maw of the void and into the backseat. Frost spreads from every place he touches in whorls of silver, glitters in his hair like streaks of stardust.

His teeth are just as silver-white when he bares his fangs at Prompto and snarls, "Go!"

The car leaps forward. Prompto realizes he's stepped on the gas.

Ignis, settled back in his own seat, growls, "Eyes on the road!" And how he knows when he's blind Prompto doesn't even question, just snaps his attention forward and wrenches the wheel around in time to keep them from wrapping themselves around a lamppost.

The wheels shriek in agony as he skins the top layer of rubber from their hides, pushing the car into a tight turn before sling-shotting them across the parking lot to the north entrance. Behind them, gunfire races to catch up, three feet, two feet, the ricochet hits the windows hard enough to crack the glass.

"Turn a corner," Ignis commands, and again Prompto obeys, picking a side at random. Instantly the shots stop, leaving them with only the roar of the engine and Prompto's ragged breathing.

Only Prompto's breathing. Because these two guys in the car with him are already dead. One of them is a vampire and the other is a who-knows what and now they've got Prompto in a car and they're all being shot at and people are being set on fire and-

_Not the time, brain!_ He tries to distract it by asking, "Where am I going?"

"Crestholm bridge. We're getting out of this city before the Enforcers can register any objections to our use of pyrotechnics," says Ignis. "And now that we're out of the line of fire, everyone roll down your windows. It'll hide the damage. We'll have to hope the dark of night will camouflage any bullet holes in the siding."

"Uh, I don't know-" _what you're talking about, if I should be doing this, who you guys even are_ "-how to get there."

"Give me a sec and I'll load up Moogle Maps," says Noctis, phone out and tapping at the screen. "I gotta leave Gladio a text to meet us. Hammerhead, right, Specs?"

"Yes. We have allies there."

Prompto says, "Allies sound good," in a voice that's weak and distant. He shivers. Is the frost spreading (devouring everything, hungry as the black void Noctis crawled out of and what if something followed him, what if it's in the car, what if it's behind Prompto _right now_) or was there any frost at all (all in his head, no one else can see and the majority rules, he can't even touch it so why insist it's there) and is Prompto even in this car (that's cold, so cold, his teeth chatter even as sweat slicks his back and armpits and-)

A hand touches his cheek.

Bare skin on skin, and so _warm_. Prompto can feel is spreading through his body, chasing away the skittering nerves and chattering voices of his paranoia, tugging him back to the present and settling him into his own bones, his own flesh, with a tenderness that leaves him gasping.

"Apologies," says Ignis. "I'd have asked first, but you were going into shock."

When he begins to pull his hand away Prompto can't resist turning his head to chase after that touch, that feeling of safety, of shelter in the embrace of something that fills every fracture in his heart with sunlight-heat that he wants to bask in forever.

"Eyes on the road," repeats Ignis. His voice is stern but his touch gives him away again, that same gentleness in how he turns Prompto's face back toward the sight of black asphalt and white lines, yellow road signs listing street names.

"Right. Driving. Safe driving. Sorry." Because yeah, it would probably be a good idea for Prompto to pay attention so he's actually driving in his own lane. Lucky thing the roads are mostly deserted this time of night, with only chalk outlines to show where people have been and will be. He fights to keep his sight at the surface level so he can see what everyone else does, so he can follow the trail written in road signs and green lights, so he can speed through the winding maze of one-ways and back alleys Noctis guides him through.

Of course, that leads to other problems since Prompto's brain is too busy to keep close supervision on his mouth, meaning awkward questions inevitably tumble off his tongue. Like, "Do you wear the gloves because your hands always feel so nice?"

As soon as the words are out his self-preservation kicks in and tries for a last-minute save by frantically sputtering, "Sorry, that was weird, I'm a weirdo, ignore me, I didn't say anything," but judging by the way Ignis has stiffened in his seat it's too late, and Prompto is soon going to be as dead as the other people in the car.

At least Noctis thinks he's funny? Lots of muffled snickering coming from the backseat, though that quickly turns to coughing when Ignis leans around to toss a blind glare behind them.

". . . I wear gloves because it prevents calluses from developing. Noctis, you are a vampire. No one in this car believes your act."

"Sorry," says Noctis without even pretend sincerity. "Iggy needs to keep his hands nice to fool people into thinking he's a wimpy paper-pusher type, uh. Huh. Didn't get your name."

Right. They don't know his name. He nibbles his lip, drums his fingers on the steering wheel. These guys actually don't know him at all, having basically kidnapped him off the street and dragged him along, and it's been way too easy to get caught up in the moment, letting them carry him farther and farther from his apartment and his comfort zone and his chances of escape.

Which, honestly? Not too surprising, considering the vast quantities of _nothing_ keeping him anchored in that house-not-a-home, that life without family or friends or decent internet speed. But driving out of the city with two dead strangers in a stolen car is not the kind of positive life change he's been trying for, so it's time to make some serious effort to bail out before he's strapped in for the full ride.

"Can I just give you the car instead? Of my name, I mean. Like, I get that it's not really my car to give, since we stole it, but I'd be happy to get out at any corner and let you guys drive off into the sunrise without me? And I won't go to the cops," he continues, frantically building up walls of words against the mirrored stare Ignis is turning on him, plumes of blue flames curling over the edge of his glasses like groping fingers. His own hands clench on the curve of the steering wheel tight enough to leave dents. "Since I'm an accomplice, and anyway they'd never believe me about the whole vampire thing, and I've got a terrible memory so I'll totally forget I ever saw you, and please don't eat me I'm on a diet and my blood count is probably low."

They're already gotten so far from the tattered neighbourhoods Prompto knows, driven deep into the vast canyon of the financial district with its towering walls of grey concrete and black glass and white, white lights. Everything in contrast so sharp you could cut yourself on it. Could he walk home from here with his skin in one piece? He's willing to try.

"We're not gonna eat you," Noctis says firmly. "You saved my life. It'd be rude to eat you after that, and I was taught better."

Ignis lifts an eyebrow. "Indeed."

"And we can let you out if you really want us to, but uh. It's . . . kind of a bad idea."

"It is?" Prompto's forced to slow and stop for a red light, which feels more than a little symbolic. _Ominous_, even, with the way its unblinking eye bores into him, watching with hidden cameras, transmitting into databases, recording and cataloguing him for the consumption of the faceless entities that run this machine called a city.

"Yeah. See, those guys chasing us? They're- They aren't human. At all. And now that they've seen you, all of them will recognize you. And I do mean _all_ of them. Um, how do I explain it? They have a lot of bodies, but only one mind . . ."

"No, I get it," says Prompto, still staring up at the digital star bleeding scarlet light. "But that doesn't matter, right? I'm just a nobody. Human. So basic that plain yoghurt is a more exciting flavour. There's no reason for them to go after me."

Ignis makes the world's worst imitation of a laugh. "Even if that were true, which it isn't, it wouldn't matter. The mind controlling those bodies is a sadist. His name is Ardyn, and once you have the misfortune to cross his path he'll track you down for the simple pleasure of inflicting misery. Don't think that he'll discard you as a waste of time, either. He is immortal. Time means nothing to him, and with his thralls he has an unlimited number of bodies with which to pursue his amusements."

Prompto says, "Oh."

"Yeah, so. Unless you really wanna risk going it alone you're kinda stuck with us. Sorry." At least this time Noctis sounds like he means it.

Not that it helps against the feeling of the red strands of fate tightening around Prompto's throat, a noose as scarlet as the eye above and just as indifferent to his longings for freedom. "The wrong time and place, huh?"

"Something like that. Sorry," Noctis says again.

"'s fine. It was gonna happen someday." He'd kept his eyes closed against the world for years because he'd known that to _see_ was to be _seen_, to be pulled deeper into a world of twilight and howling void, and he wanted so badly to fit into the pretty coloured-crayon life his parents had built for their (pet project) adopted child, where things were sunshine and rainbows and steady 9 to 5 jobs and safe. Things were _safe_.

He'd tried and tried even when there was no-one to try for, his parents abandoning their efforts as soon as the cost/benefit analysis showed he was a bad investment. Tried even when it made him sick, and fat, and sad, and still so horribly alone, and for what? In the end he's still himself, strange and strange-sighted, and in a car with strange strangers.

"I'm Prompto. Prompto Argentum."

With his surrender comes release. The red light dies and green flames to life, and he's free to drive onward into the unknown. The letters from a billboard selling cologne drop like ripe fruit and spell out 'ONE WAY'; the streetlights flicker off as he passes each one, and the reflection of the car might only be a suggestion in the black mirrored windows of these monuments to capitalism, but Ignis and Noctis and even himself are picked out in perfect detail, embroidered with red thread.

"A pleasure," says Ignis with (and this is mindboggling) actual sincerity. "I am Ignis Scientia, and this is His Highness, Prince Noctis Lucis Caelum."

Prompto's, "A prince?! Really?!" overlaps with Noctis' bitter, "Prince of what? A stolen car?"

Ignis' answer is firm. "Prince of this city. Your home is still here, Noctis, with the shades of your ancestors, the bones of your blood-kin. He cannot take those things from you no matter how he tries. You know this."

" . . . yeah. Thanks, Specs."

"And of course," Ignis' voice goes warm and soft and worshipful, "you are also _my_ Prince."

'It was worth it' carved into Ignis' flesh and soul. Was it worth it? Is _Noctis_ worth it? Why? _How_?

(could Prompto someday be worth that much to someone?)

Then, before Noctis can say anything and Prompto has time to savour the awkwardness of being a third wheel at the wheel, Ignis continues in cheerful, ordinary tones, "And though Ardyn may have succeeded in driving us out of the city, at least we have a charming young mortal to be our chauffeur."

"So are you also something fancy, like a Duke or an Earl or a Cid?" Prompto rushes to ask to keep himself from reading too much into Ignis' flattery. Not easy with the memory of Ignis' touch still singing on his skin. He tries desperately to pay attention instead to the roads, where cars are finally beginning to appear. It must have passed the 4am mark.

"Myself? I'm nothing special. I'm a retainer, a soul chosen by his father from amid a throng of the damned, dragged from the very bowels of Hell to serve Noctis. Oof!"

A flash of movement that Prompto can just see at the corner of his eye; Noctis giving the back of Ignis' seat another good kick. "Bullshit. You knew me before you went to law school."

"True, but I wasn't your retainer then."

"Like you'd ever be anything else!"

Words so heavy with truth that Noct's voice breaks under the weight of them, that the car dips and sags in its suspension under the load, forcing Prompto to fight the wheel to keep them from swerving off onto the sidewalk. Tires squeal, the three of them are tossed against their seatbelts, and a taxi zips around them with the uncanny agility of its kind, its horn bawling in outrage the whole way. A grey sedan passes them, too, adding its own loud opinion, and Prompto cringes in the driver's seat as Ignis turns a glacial mirrored scowl toward him.

"_Prompto . . ._ "

"Please don't sue," he bleats. "I can't meet the court date when I'm on the run!"

"Sue?! Be grateful I don't take the idea of habeas corpus literally," Ignis snaps. "I'm already sorely tempted to have you arrested for abusing a corpse!"

"Okay. Very scary threat. But, uh. Do you even still qualify as a corpse if you're walking and talking? Also, which way do I turn?" he asks. They've made it to blocks of boutiques and cafes, where their car's reflection swims through the windows and the streets are lined with trees that sway like seaweed from the rising currents of growing traffic.

"Go right," says Noctis. There's lazy amusement in his voice when he asks, "_Do_ we count as corpses, Specs?"

"Yes, as long as we keep still and silent. A feat which I fear will be dismayingly easy if Prompto smashes us against a wall."

"I'm being good!" Prompto protests. _As good as I can be._

The confused whirl of leaves and shadows dazzles Prompto's eyes. The first few pedestrians dart out from cover. It'll be morning soon.

"You're drifting centre lane," Ignis corrects primly.

He is, too. He nudges the wheel and asks, "How did you-"

"And you've left your turn signal on."

"Dammit!"

The drive continues like that, with Ignis making tart comments and Noctis giving directions that soon become liberally salted with yawns. He's not shy about his fangs, little white knives that flash in the twilight of the backseat. He doesn't look dangerous, though. More like a cat, sleepy blue eyes and soft black fur, ready to bed down in the sun.

_The shade_, Prompto reminds himself. _Vampire kitty!_

They wind their way through the outer suburbs of Insomnia, with its reefs of hedges and flowering bushes, the white coral of single family homes, to drift into the river that is the highway which carries them across the great arc of the bridge out, out, out into the world, while the shadows grow sharper every moment. The stars are a glittering digital display counting down the minutes until the sun claws its way over the horizon. Noctis slurs his words, his head drooping.

Ignis says, "Sleep, Noct. You said it's a straightaway from here. We'll be fine."

"Mmmm." He curls up on the bench seat, tucking himself up against the door until he's little more than a dark lump.

"What about you?" Prompto whispers. He risks a glance to the side and sees shadows smudging the perfection of Ignis' face, the awful blaze of his eyes behind the visor down to sputtering sparks that drip sad sapphire down his shirt front.

"I'm not a vampire. I am not called to sleep when the stars fade."

"But you're tired," says Prompto.

"Alas, the fate of the restless dead," Ignis says lightly.

"Do you not sleep at all?"

Behind them is the city, its garlands of neon and spangles of streetlights dimming, dying. Before them is the bleak emptiness of the desert, a vast sweep of landscape left blank, grey on grey in the dusky pre-dawn, disappearing into the gloomy mist of lingering night.

Nothing behind them. Nothing ahead of them. Noctis asleep like the dead thing he is. The world has vanished, and the two of them are alone.

Very, very quietly, Ignis confesses: " . . . I don't know"

The silence stretches on after that, as endless as the road.

~

The Hammerhead garage rises from the barren Leiden savanna in a shining, shimmering fountain of aluminium walls and neon signage. There are lights on, and even at this hour the parking area and gas pumps both are littered with cars, trucks, even a few motorcycles.

"There should be a camper on the far side of the diner," murmurs Ignis, shifting around in his seat so he can pull out his wallet, from which he pulls a wad of bills. "Pull us up as close as you can, then go find the owner and ask if we can rent it."

Prompto stays put, hands on the wheel. "What about the cops? This thing is stolen, and with the bullet holes in it-"

"No one will care. Or, to be more precise, no one will notice. The Hammerhead is Master Cid's Domain."

Okay, that explains exactly nothing, but with the windows rolled down Prompto can smell meat and grease and potato and his stomach rumbles approval at the possibility of digesting something other than itself.

Ignis pushes the money at him again. "There should be enough extra to get you something to eat as well."

". . . thanks."

"Just be sure to come help me get Noctis inside before you leave to hunt the fearsome breakfast beast."

"Gotcha." The car snugged away in the shadows of Takka's Pit Stop, Prompto unbuckles and tumbles from the driver's side, legs stiff and knees stiff and butt stiff and back stiff from the five hours of driving. He groans and stretches, back arching and arms reaching until he's up on his toes, feels the pop of every joint and the rush of blood returning to muscles gone shrivelled and cold. Then he shakes himself, gives his scalp a good scratch, and trots toward the Mini-Mart.

He's careful where he steps: the ground is a mess of arrows tracing curlicue paths around the pavement to slingshot out in every direction, with helpful labels like 'this way to dirt' and 'going nowhere,' and he's not sure if they're memories or suggestions or dooms. It means he's skipping and tripping, weaving around other drivers and in between the pumps in a round-about path, so focused on his feet that he registers the bucket but not the lady with the sponge.

Not until he bumps into her, and then he's got only the briefest impressions of soft breasts and wide green eyes as he stumbles backward, trips over the bucket, loses his balance and lands square on his ass in a splash of dirty soapsuds. The water seeps into his ratty boots (Glaive surplus) and his jeans (thrift store score) and leaves him soaking in embarrassment (a Prompto original.)

Probably a good thing, though. The cold water keeps him from embarrassing himself worse when the woman bends over him in a display of concern and heavenly breasts. "Gosh, you okay down there?"

Her blonde hair glows, lit by the techno halo of the gas station's halogen lights, the sharp shadows bring into stark relief the curve of soft flesh, and from this angle he can just glimpse the tan lines peeking from under her itty bitty shorts. "I'm _fantastic_!"

She quirks an eyebrow, purses her lips in a pretty pink bow, lower lip jutting just enough to make fantasies float past his mind's eye, mirages from too long driving in the desert heat. "Well, if you say so." She bends even lower to set right the bucket and for a moment he has serious trouble keeping from dying right then and there because it almost looks like she's reaching for _him_ and the overload of impossibilities has his heart seizing up in sharp cramps, but then she's dropping the sponge in the bucket and straightening up again. "Seems to me like you've maybe been too long in the driver's seat if you think sitting on the ground is that great."

She wipes her hands dry on the ass of her shorts. Prompto's brain immediately supplies a different context for the motion. "So. Looks like you've got business here. I'm Cindy, the mechanic. Anything I can do you for?" Prompto's brain supplies new context for _that_, too.

But he can see it written on her perfect face in smears of grease: She's out of his league and out of his reach, a million miles away even when she's right in front of him, her shadow stretching long to root itself in the foundations of this place, keeping her tied here while he's landed on a yellow arrow that promises to lead him 'TO DESTINY.'

"You can get anywhere from here, huh?" he mumbles.

Cindy straightens a bit more, her eyes narrowing, and suddenly there's something other than casual friendliness layered in with her country drawl. "For the right price you sure can. Is that what you want?"

He scrapes himself off the ground, watches the other arrows snake away to burrow into the asphalt. His boots squelch a bit. Not a big deal in the desert. "No. At least, I don't think so? Not right now?" He hesitates, and adds, "I'll have to ask Iggy and Noct. For now, we just wanna rent the camper."

Again that searching look. "Iggy and Noct, is it? Huh. You got the cash?"

He hands her the wad of bills and watches as she peels them off quick, her fingers nimble, her mouth moving in silent count. "Good. You got enough. Here," she pulls out a set of keys from her jacket even as she pockets the money with her other hand. "Move your car next to the camper and get yourselves settled in. Don't worry about the mess of it. I'll let Pawpaw know you're staying, and he'll make sure everyone minds their own business."

"Thanks, Cindy."

"Ain't no trouble for the local Prince and his retinue," she says, and strides off with her hips swinging and her breasts bouncing, leaving Prompto to gape after her.

A glint of light at the horizon snaps him out of it. He scuttles back over to the car, jerks open the door and dumps himself in the driver's seat. "We're good to go," he tells Ignis. "Just gotta park this a bit closer."

"Good. I'll be glad to get Noctis under cover."

"Um." Prompto drums his fingers on the steering wheel. "Is it . . . okay . . . if Cindy knows Noct's a prince? The mechanic here, I mean."

Ignis doesn't so much as twitch. "Of course. They are allies, remember, and no more human than you are. It's why I chose this place."

"O-oh." Prompto chews on that as he moves the car, parking it right in front of the camper so its shadow falls across the door, in position to shield Noctis from the rising sun. He slips out and over to Ignis' side, and holds the door open for him so he can pull Noctis from the back seat and carry him in the cradle of his arms.

Prompto touches Ignis' shoulder, and then, greatly daring, puts his hand on Ignis' back. "This way. I'll, um, guide you?"

"Thank you."

"Here's the door. There's three steps. Okay, standard layout and also really ugly, but clean. The bed's straight ahead, kinda low. Yeah, you got it."

He watches Ignis lay Noctis on the bedspread: the way he's careful to cradle Noct's head in one hand to prevent bumps, the way he smooths back Noct's hair, the way he unlaces Noct's boots and starts tugging them off, and even if Prompto was as blind as Ignis he'd know there was . . . love there. _Care_. The kind that Prompto's never known.

". . . that's the second time you've said something about me being not human," he says. He wants to ask, 'Is that why my parents never touched me, like you do for Noct? Loved me like you do for Noct?' but instead he tries, "Do you . . . know what I am?"

Both boots are off and laid neatly by the bedside. Ignis starts tugging the covers out from under Noctis, slow and smooth, as if afraid to wake him up. Who knows. Maybe vampires are light sleepers.

"I don't even know what _I_ am anymore," sighs Ignis. He takes a moment to straighten Noct's arms and legs. "However, if I had to guess, I'd say you've mixed blood from something or another in you. The mediums of Tenebrae, perhaps, or even the mages of Niflheim. Anyone in your family a bit odd?"

"I'm adopted."

"Mmm. Unfortunately, that's not surprising. With all the dangers facing those of us living on the fringes of humanity, I fear it's all too common for our kind to find themselves alone." Noctis tucked in like a kid, Ignis stands and stretches, a lean predator warming up, then spoils the image by pulls off his dark glasses and rubbing his eyes, showering the inside of the camper with his glittering tears, a showy display for his obvious exhaustion. "Which brings us to a rather delicate subject. I wish to talk to you about the dangers particular to our little band, and to, ah. Make you an offer."

Those last four words hang in the air around them in iron-heavy font and Prompto swallows against a throat gone inexplicably dry. "Sounds serious."

Ignis slips the mirrored glasses back into place. With his face shielded and voice as smooth as only a lawyer's can be, all the conscience and compassion polished out, he says, "It is. I wish to know if you would like me to kill you."

_kill you_

It drops to the floor at Prompto's feet in a spatter of scarlet, drips into the seams of the cheap linoleum flooring, only to vanish beneath the flurry of 'would you like?' that rain down like autumn leaves, their question marks as tangled as Prompto's thoughts.

"But you- But Noct said-" he squeaks.

"Noctis said we wouldn't eat you," says Ignis. He crosses his arms. "Please don't misunderstand me, Prompto. I have no wish to murder you for either sustenance or sport. My offer comes entirely from a place of concern."

And when Prompto looks at him, really _looks_ at him, Ignis is clean of the creeping mildew of lies, his skin marked only by soot and flame as his soul blazes with love and devotion, with clarity of purpose and of heart, an inferno that has burnt away everything but Noctis, and Noctis, and Noctis, Noctis, Noctis, Noctis Noctis Noctis NoctisNoctisNoctisnoctisnoctis-

Prompto shudders and tears his gaze away. "Weirdly enough, I believe you. Uh, but I would really rather stay alive, unless there's, like, a super good reason not to?" He glances sideways at Ignis' reflection in the camper's tiny windows, twice over indirect to muffle the truth, but even that can't soften the grim line of Ignis' mouth. ". . . there is, isn't there?"

Ignis tilts his head. "Is there a place to sit in this tin can?"

"I think there's a pullout table set."

The hinges are old and stick and squeal protest, the plastic discoloured with age and sun-bleaching. It takes some fighting to get it into configuration, even with Ignis' help; moments spent together, shoulder to shoulder in battle against stubborn furniture, close enough for Prompto to get another whiff of that intoxicating cologne, feel the heat coming from that lean body. With the top two buttons of Ignis' shirt open he can see the sharp lines of collarbone, the soft dip at the base of the throat, and Prompto does _not_ know where to look now, with Ignis' face full of secrets Prompto doesn't want to know and Ignis' body full of temptations Prompto doesn't want to feel. By the time they have the table finally unfolded and they're sitting on the attached benches, he's pathetically grateful that Ignis is blind and doesn't know Prompto has resorted to staring at the floor.

Black gloved fingers drum out the slow tempo of a dirge before Ignis finally speaks. "It has always been a commonly held belief that vampires are immortal. That is inaccurate. Vampires may not age or sicken, and they may be difficult to kill, but they _can_ be killed. Thus, they are mortal. You understand?"

Prompto nods, then remembers to stammer, "Yeah."

"The creature pursuing us is immortal. At least," Ignis adds dryly, "as far as we've been able to discover. Stabbing, shooting, decapitation, burning, freezing, electrocution, and a host of other attempts were made, and all have proven fruitless so far. That alone would make him dangerous, but worse still is his ability to . . . assimilate. You recall Noctis telling you that there are many bodies, but one mind? Ardyn is able to- to _infect_ the living with his blood. It changes them, eats away at them until they are prisoners of their own bodies, puppets for him to play with. He can control them, sculpt their flesh like clay, see through their eyes. There are few defences. There is no cure." The fingers still. "The only escape is death."

Prompto, still shying from the the truths Ignis wears on his face and that pour from his eyes, says to the tabletop, "But that's only _if_ I get infected. I mean, it's not like it's a guarantee, right? So why jump the gun?"

"Because we can't kill you if we can't find you," says Ignis bluntly. "That Ardyn will pursue you is a given. He delights in destroying anyone with whom Noctis has so much as crossed shadows. My fear is that if he catches you he'll keep you hidden, and you'll suffer for years in his grasp as his- his _toy_," spits Ignis, the word tumbling out ugly and twisted with the scars of first-hand knowledge, and Prompto tries to look away but forgets that means looking up at Ignis, and by then it's too late.

Now that he's looking he can see the hand prints that cradle Ignis' face, mark his cheeks like wilted flowers, creep down his throat like a strangling vine. Fingerprints scatter through his hair like ash, and shadows streak down his cheeks, his soul crying over a memory even those sapphire flames can't seem to burn away.

"He hurt you," says Prompto in growing horror as he takes in the shapeless phantoms clawing at Ignis' shoulders, whispering in his ears, their faces masks of terror.

Ignis just laughs. "Pain is too crude for Ardyn. I killed myself rather than become his creature, and it was worth every agonizing moment to slip his grasp."

Cold in the camper, suddenly. Cold in Prompto's guts and along his spine as the pieces come together to make a glittering mosaic of flame and death. Ignis clutching his hand to his chest as the blue ghost of fire sets him alight and fireflies up his skin to the black pus oozing from his eyes, devours the sickness and more, and more, and more, until Ignis is eaten alive from the inside, crying fire as "-your brain is cooked and your tongue becomes leather and you _won't stop smiling-_"

The world is dark.

There is a warm hand, a gentle hand, pressed to Prompto's face, covering his eyes. He leans into the touch, grateful, shivering so bad his muscles cramp up his back, his mind as blank and dark as his sight. A second hand comes up and pets his cheek and he stops grinding his teeth. Hadn't realized he'd been doing it.

"Enough." The voice is as gentle as the hands. "That is my pain to bear."

More petting, on Prompto's face, carding through his hair, until the shaking fades and his jaw works and he can stammer, "S-sorry. Sorry. I don't. Usually. See that much."

"Well, I suppose it was rather eye-catching."

"I- w-what?"

"Let's hope the memory hasn't been seared into your brain, too."

"Are you . . . is that a _joke?!_" gasps Prompto, and he's horrified but he can already feel the laughter rising and then Ignis says,

"Too much? I do ash that you fire-give me. We're new acquaintances, so I'm working blind on how you react to blackened humour."

And Prompto's gasping, "Stop, stop!" between bouts of giggles a little too edged with hysteria to be comfortable coming out, stinging in his throat and biting on his tongue. He can't swallow the hysteria back, it has to come out, and with it the barbed wire lengths of his emotions tangled around the mass of words.

"You guys are dead, but you're _people_, but you're _dead_, and I helped you and no good deed, right? So then we were shot at and I got _hit_, on the ear which is almost my brain, except it wasn't cool enough to pierce it, I guess I just have a weird nick. And then we stole a car and the cops will be after us and a monster is after us, scary enough to make you set yourself on _fire_, and now, _now_, you are making jokes. Bad jokes. Like, _really_ bad, dude. I'm g-gonna," his heavy tongue fumbles the words, "hold. hold this. grudge against you _forever_ for. for. You know."

"A regret I shall carry to my grave," says Ignis, serious as a heart attack, and it sets Prompto off all over again, until the laughter has opened the wound inside him enough that the ugly pus of tears can leak out at last, dripping out from under Ignis' fingers and carrying with it all the fear, all the horror.

How long he sits crying with Ignis' touch his only anchor, he doesn't know. Long enough for him to feel sick, and thirsty. Long enough for him to make the grossest mess of Ignis' hand, with tears and sweat and snot and spit. He takes in shaky breaths, reaches up and feels tentatively at those long, strong fingers. "Oh. Oh man, I am so sorry, I-"

"Not to worry," Ignis interrupts. "I did the cleaning and laundry for Noctis through his teenage years. I assure you I've touched much worse. I'll go wash once you close your eyes. My face was bad enough," he says dryly. "I don't want to know what my bare hands might show you."

"Oh. Um. Okay." He's reluctant to obey, reluctant to lose that touch.

"Take your time."

No judgement in Ignis' voice. It's as comforting as Ignis' hand, enough that Prompto actually believes him and dares to let his heart stop racing, to swallow back the ugly taste in his mouth, to wipe his nose with the back of his hand, jostling Ignis'.

Ignis sighs. "And you will wash your hands as well."

Prompto winces. "Sorry. Bad habit? Uh, closing eyes now. You can stop touching this gross excuse for a human."

"Thank you." Ignis pulls his hands away and a bit of Prompto's heart goes with it, the lonely bits that cling to any act of kindness, to any smile, to any hope. "Where's the sink?"

"Opposite side of the camper, back toward the door."

Prompto rubs at his wet nose, the skin hot and sore and a bit gooey still. Ugh. Listens to Ignis moving, the sound of cloth, and expensive shoes, and fingers tapping lightly across the counter top as he feels his way. Ignis' soft grunt of satisfaction, and the sudden rush of water. Quiet sounds. Calm sounds. Peaceful sounds.

"You're nice," says Prompto into that peace.

Ignis doesn't answer, and for a while Prompto thinks he didn't hear. Keeps listening to the Ignis-noise, trying to guess what he's doing in a weird kind of role reversal. More patting around - looking for soap? Oops, that thunk means he probably dropped it. Hollow metal tapping in the sink. More splashing, he must have found the soap.

At last Ignis says, ". . . perhaps I am. But for your own sake, Prompto, please remember that 'nice' or even 'kind' is not the same as 'good'. I am not a good person. And neither is Noctis, nor Gladio, nor anyone associated with us. If you wish to stay alive, that means staying with us, and that means you may see things, you may be forced to do things, you very much regret."

"'Good,' huh?" mutters Prompto.

'Good' is taking a kid out of the System and giving him a house to live in (not a home, never a home, there was _never anybody home_) even though he's troubled (especially because he's troubled) and putting him in the best schools (to decorate a resume) and taking him out to parks and museums and art galleries (and anyplace that would look good in photos you share with the faceless masses that follow your blog.)

'Good' is building a tiny space for a kid to fit into just so (children need structure,) pruning anything that slops messily over the edges (for his own good) and taking him to doctor after doctor after doctor after doctor to fix what needs fixing (that you broke) in his poor messed up brain (some kids are slow to develop, slow to grow out of childish fantasies, slow to understand the consequences of speaking too much truth).

'Good' is sighing over coffee with your friends about how some kids don't want to be saved (like you save strawberries, crushed and pulped, soaked in artificial sweeteners, locked in tiny glass prisons, perfectly packaged for public consumption), how you've tried everything (you're willing to pay for), how he's gone off to try and be independent but he'll always have a roof to come back to if he needs it (but not a home, never a home, there was never anybody home _even when there were people_).

"I am. _Really_. Sick of good," Prompto says bitterly, honest in all the ways he usually tries to avoid. "I think I'd like to try 'kind'."

Ignis' voice is in those same gentle tones when he says, "I understand."

And Prompto believes him.

~

The blue sky is the searing colour of Ignis' flames. The white sun batters every shadow into a weak black smudge. Prompto lounges in the plastic chairs outside the camper and wonders when this 'Gladio' is gonna show up. He'd phoned Ignis in the early hours of morning and said something about delays. Prompto, full of grease and salt and goodwill from Takka's, had volunteered to stand (sit) watch after Ignis admitted he wasn't sure what would happen if he caught a facefull of sunlight.

So now Prompto's draped in one of the cheap plastic chairs outside, wondering if he'll melt before his seat does, and if he'll be able to scrape himself back together like Ignis did.

Ignis. Prompto's head is filled with Ignis, which is frustrating because he'd way prefer to have it filled with Cindy. He's got an incredible view of her slinking around a lucky customer's car, trailing soapsuds behind her as she preps the machine for a good scrub, giving the driver his final thrill before he follows the arrow leading him off to 'the end of the line'. When she bends over the hood Prompto gets the other half of the view she'd treated him to before, those scrap-of-fabric shorts making it real clear she hasn't got anything on underneath, and if it was up to him he'd be sneaking into the diner restroom to rub one out over fantasies of her sitting in his lap.

Instead he sits and turns his gaze to the blank page of desert horizon and fills it with the picture that won't leave his brain.

It's the smile. Ignis' smile as he burned to death.

It wasn't crazy, wasn't the wild tilt of lips and teeth you'd expect from someone batshit enough to light himself on fire. It was a _real_ smile, fragile and lovely and so damn _proud_, and it haunts Prompto, hanging in his mind's eye like a sunset, a tragedy of flames flaring bright and beautiful, and he finds it's impossible to look away from a love so strong.

Prompto wants, he wants and he _wants_, even if he's not sure which part, the devotion or the passion, to be the target or the sacrifice.

(if he stays with them can he have that? can he take that, steal that, _beg_ that from them?)

But the thing is, that was just Ignis' face. What else is he hiding? He told Prompto not to look at his bare hands but there's six feet of lean body swathed in black silk and cotton and leather, and trying to figure out what's safe to look at is driving Prompto a little nuts. Is it safe for Prompto to stare at the pretty line of Ignis' clavicles in the open collar of his button-down? What if Ignis undoes the rest of it, bares his chest, his belly, the dip of his navel, the peaks of his nipples-

He knows the touch of Ignis' hands, the smooth, warm feel of his skin. Is he like that all over or are there more scars? He knows Ignis is strong but is that because he's dead and nothing but passion in a human husk, or is there muscle on that body? Broad shoulders. Trim waist. Long, long legs, and are _those_ safe? Hard to imagine Ignis taking off his pants to give Prompto a glimpse. How _could_ he get a glimpse-

Prompto groans and grinds the heels of hands into his eye sockets.

He's not a creeper, he _isn't_, can't help that seeing makes him want to see more. That the hypnotic pull of the forbidden that makes him want to peer through the layers to the open wounds Ignis hides underneath, dip his fingers into heartblood and feel the heat of that passion, the divine fires of Ifrit that blaze in the bones of that slender frame. Can't help the urge to slice Ignis' belly up the middle and climb inside him and finally be (loved) warm, which, okay, no.

Time to stop thinking about Ignis. Time to stop looking at Ignis, even if it's only in Prompto's imagination. He needs to close his eyes and let the darkness smooth the edges of sight gone too sharp, needs to put up walls again and look at things sideways, ignore the truth and believe the lies.

Humans aren't meant to see things the way they really are. That's why the more they see the less human they become, the mind and soul twisting inward to protect themselves until they're inside-out and upside-down (and no means yes, yes, _yes_).

So Prompto sits in his uncomfortable plastic chair, and sweats, and breathes, and listens to the sounds of wind shed by cars on the road, the low rumble of engines, the distant twang of Cindy talking.

And worries. What will happen if he really looks at Noctis? Beautiful like the moon, cold and pretty and distant, glowing bright against the empty black background of the everyday. He's _dead_. He's dead and he crawls through the cracks in the delicate shell of reality and also for sure eats people, drinks their blood and their life. What's hiding behind the veil of his skin? What abyss will stare into Prompto's soul if he dares take a peek?

And what about this 'Gladio'? What will Prompto see when he looks at this guy? Ignis had pulled up a couple of pictures on his phone of a tall, dark, and handsome dude with an aversion to shirts and the most incredible tattoo Prompto has ever seen, but a picture is just a record of light bouncing off the mask worn by the actual person. Is he like Ignis, a flame feeding off a bleeding heart? Or is he like Noctis, as alien as the stars? All Ignis had said was that Gladio "bears the mark of Noctis' power."

(Ardyn is able to infect the living)

Prompto shivers, chilled despite the desert heat. He dares to crack his eyes open at the vast expanse of blue above him. The sky over Hammerhead is wallpapered in fragments of dreams that glimmer like smiles for someone else, like loose change at the bottom of a fountain. If Prompto took a photo would he see the world as everyone else does, in flat colour and empty expanses? His fingers twitch for his lost phone. He broke the screen two weeks ago so he left it at the apartment, and now it's gone forever.

The car Cindy was washing drives off. The movement catches his eye and he finds himself watching the ebb and flow of traffic as it traces out the web of destinies tangled in the parking lot, stretching out to the edges of the world. He drifts, time layering over him, seconds-minutes-hours wrapping him in the cottony softness of apathetic stupor. Or maybe it's the sun baking the brains in his skull. Whatever the case, he doesn't register Gladio's arrival until the man's shadow splashes across Prompto's face.

He blinks the shadows from his eyes, looks up and takes in the scars and the rugged beauty and the expanse of bare chest and the fact that this guy is _human_ except where he's not, like in the prowling way he moves closer, the storm clouds roiling in his shadow, the yellow glint in his brown eyes.

The wet red collar around his neck.

"Gladio, right?" Prompto croaks. Sweet Shiva, but he's suddenly thirsty. "Hi!"

He gets a grunt and a slow once over in return. "You must be the kid Iggy talked about. Puny thing, aren't you?" And before Prompto can muster his ultra-witty retort Gladio orders, "Stay outside. I gotta talk to Ignis."

He moves past, his muscles rippling and the swell of his ass in his leather pants breathtaking, and each step he takes in his steel-toed boots is heavy and loud on the parking lot pavement, shaking Prompto's bones. For all that this Gladio is human (_just_ human) the beast painted on his skin seems almost tame compared to the feral snarl on his face, the clench of those big, _big_ hands. He's taller than Ignis, broader than Ignis, and really, _really_ mad.

He doesn't bother with the camper steps, either. Wrenches open the door and steps inside directly, slams it shut so hard the entire camper rattles like the tin can Ignis named it, enough to make the cheap plastic windows shake loose, and if Prompto can't see inside he can hear.

And so he's forced to listen.

"Ignis."

"Gladio."

Bitter laughter. "Sure it's me? That I'm not some meat puppet made up to look —sorry, sound— like him? That's how Ardyn got you last time, right? With a fancy fake?"

The silence that follows steals the breath from Prompto's throat. Ignis had said this Ardyn guy could 'sculpt flesh like clay' but Prompto hadn't realized- hadn't thought-

Marks on Ignis' face and throat and Ardyn had hurt him. Is that how? Is that how he got close, got his hands on-

"I walked right past your little guard and what're you gonna do? Do you even know where I _am_ in this shitty tin tube? Or do I gotta make noise, call you like a dog?" Thud-thud-squeal as the cheap aluminium wall dents under the pounding of a meaty fist. "Here! I'm right here, Iggy, come and get me. Except you can't do that, can you, because then what? You'll hit me with your fucking cane?" The crash of something falling, breaking. "If you can even get to me past whatever I just dumped all over the floor. What d'you think it was? Something I brought in? Something that was already here? Did you even think to check what was in this rat trap before you tucked the princess into bed?"

Ignis' voice, gone low so Prompto all can catch is the rich cadence of that accent, and Prompto squirms in his chair, knowing he shouldn't when someone like Gladio is so angry, but still wanting to get closer, hear more of Ignis (see more of Ignis? Prompto could peek through the window, could see the shift of Ignis' face, watch the words leave his mouth like gilded flowers as flame dances in his eyes)

"Too_ loud?!_" roars Gladio. "So now all it takes is some yelling to rattle you? How the hell did you even leave the motel? Fuck, while we're at it, _why_ the hell did you even leave the motel? I told you to stay- No, _you_ listen to _me!_ I told you to stay put. But no, four days is enough for you to learn to tie your shoes so it's a great idea to marathon across the fucking city in case His Highness' diaper needed changing, and never mind the kid's the only one of us that freak can't track. You led it right to him, forced him to look after _your_ blind ass while on the run, and, _and!_ you dragged a mortal into it, too! Did you forget your brain when gluing yourself back together?!"

More of Ignis' quiet words, interrupted by Gladio snarling, "For what, to be Noct's next snack?"

Every twitch and wiggle Prompto makes in his chair inches it closer to the window. He's not just curious now, he's desperate to know what they're saying because it's about him, he's sure of it, and while Gladio's opinion is becoming way too clear, he doesn't know what Ignis thinks.

Might not get to hear what Ignis thinks, with Gladio rolling forward like an avalanche, his words crushing as stones when he says, "Shit, Iggy, if you came back just to drop everything in the lap of some twink off the street then you should have _just stayed dead!_"

And the camper suddenly _burns_.

"That is _enough_, Gladio!"

Ignis' voice but the roar of a furnace as well, rage that devours everything around it, that wreaths the camper in blue flames so cold they _sear_, a spectral fury that devours not flesh but soul, and Prompto tumbles to the ground as he jerks back and away, tips his chair over, lies on the cracked paving and _cowers_ before Ignis.

"Rage if you will, doubt if you will, but do not _ever_ imply I would abandon my duties to Noctis." Dead flames that writhe and dance with every word, sparks spitting and whirling up against the sky, blue on blue and terrible, beautiful, carrying the words that Prompto shouldn't be able to hear. "I am. well. aware of my current weaknesses. That is why I am doing _everything_ I can to compensate. If all you have to offer is useless criticism, then it is not I who is being a burden!"

"Ig-"

"You _left_, Gladiolus," hiss the flames that are Ignis. "You left, and have been leaving, over, and over, and _over_, with only your leash to drag you back. In the four days since I returned you were with us less than seven hours total, and _that_ is why I had to leave the motel. Because you were gone. _You_ speak to _me_ of shirking ones' duty when your shame over one failure is so great you would crawl away to die had you the choice?"

There's no answer to that beyond Gladio's silence.

The seconds clunk by, Prompto's heart hammering out the shape of each one, his gaze locked on the hypnotic swirl of azure fire that strokes the length of the camper with hungry fingers. They make shadows of the shadows, doubling them up even as they wash them out to pale copies of themselves. The world out of focus, warped by the brilliance of Ignis' furious passion.

Then there's the sound of Ignis' voice, back to its quiet lilt, and moments later the camper door swings open and it's Ignis himself, head crowned in sapphire by a halo of flames, the horrible blaze pulling away from the camper like a receding tide to wrap itself around Ignis' body, his shoulders, his face; drain away into the space behind his mirrored shades leaving behind a face wearing the glassy mask of indifference.

But it's cracked straight up the middle, a jagged fracture that catches the lingering flickers of soul-fire blue and shadow-black, its length dipping down Ignis' throat past the bruises of memory and arrowing toward his heart, and even as Prompto watches those graceful gloved hands come up to adjust hair and glasses, the tips of Ignis' fingers fragment, crumble.

He's hesitating on the camper steps.

Because he doesn't know what's outside, Prompto realizes. And he's left his cane somewhere in the camper.

_Awkwa~rd_.

Especially after having listen to that Gladio guy completely trash him about being a dumbass. If anyone deserves a save, it's Ignis, so Prompto calls out, "H-hey! Hey, Ignis!" then instantly realizes he's got no idea where to go from there and so spouts off the first thing that pops into his brain. "Congrats on not melting in the sun?"

The grinding snap of breaking glass, chips of the stuff dripping from Ignis' mask, from his face, from his fingers as he starts to fragment even worse. ". . . I forgot. I . . . ."

Breaking apart over maybes and what ifs. Prompto sees himself reflected in more than just Ignis' mirrored shades, and the sting of secondhand (first hand) misery has him scrabbling to make things right, spurring him up off the asphalt to stumble to Ignis' side. With Ignis so tall and standing on the camper's steps, Prompto's gentle shoulder check lands somewhere near the guy's waist instead, but it's at least enough of a jostle to get Ignis' attention so Prompto can tell him, "Can't forget what you didn't know, right?"

"I wasn't think-"

"Seems to _me_," Prompto says loudly, stampeding his words across the rails of Ignis' guilt-train, "that you were maybe thinking too much! Like, whatever you are's gotta have instincts, right? Otherwise we wouldn't even have vampires because they'd all have roasted themselves before now, or starved to death 'cuz they didn't know they had to drink blood, or, uh, wandered into a Haven and dissolved in holy light."

"That one's a myth," corrects Ignis, absently, automatically, his head tilted to the side, and his next few words seem more for himself. "Instincts . . . I hadn't even considered the possibility. An abomination shouldn't have such things but- That I was able to do this, that I'm certainly not the first- I wonder. . . "

Nuh uh. No going back to brooding on Prompto's watch. Do that too soon and you almost always backslide into bad thoughts, in his experience. Better to keep things moving so that when Ignis does go back to those ideas it's with a better taste in his mouth. And speaking of. "_I'm_ wondering if you can eat lunch! What d'ya say, Igster? Care to try Takka's deep fried grease? He seasons it really well with potatoes."

When Ignis lets the nickname pass with only a twitch of his eyebrows, Prompto counts it as a success.

When Ignis says, "Why not? They do say 'you are what you eat.' Perhaps Takka's diner will hold the answers we both lack," easily including Prompto in this quest for self-discovery (he remembered, he cared enough to remember, he cares), Prompto counts it as a victory.

"Sounds good, though I gotta tell ya, the only thing I discovered about myself in there last time was that I'm still a slut for hot fries and a cold milkshake. You, uh." Prompto swallows back his pounding heart, tries to get his clumsy tongue to fake nonchalance. "You mind holding my hand on the way there? So I don't get lost in the crowd."

". . . of course."

The feeling of warm leather, strong fingers wrapping around Prompto's in that surprisingly gentle grip? That's a gold-star win.

~

Prompto slurps at the last of his milkshake. The diner is mostly empty right now, and he and Ignis have slid into a booth at the back, so he feels comfortable bringing up what's been on his mind since they pulled into Hammerhead this morning. "Okay, I gotta ask because it's really been bugging me. What would you have done about Noct if we couldn't make it here before sunrise?"

"Put him in the car's trunk, of course," says Ignis. Serious voice, serious face.

Prompto eyes him suspiciously. "Did they teach you to lie that well in lawyer school?"

"Say that again and I'll sue you for defamation." The light and shadow cast by the blinds dip into the near invisible curve of Ignis' smile. Tailored and stylish, he should look out of place in this old diner, with its chrome detailing worn black and its chipped linoleum flooring, its tabletops yellowed with age and the radio playing songs even the DJ seems to only half remember.

Instead he looks timelessly stylish, the haze of desert dust on his black-on-black clothing fading him enough that you'd think someone brought to life a vintage snapshot, and Prompto has to remind himself that staring at Ignis is a bad idea.

He tries to shake his fascination by way of a subject change. "You're just cranky 'cause I get to eat fries and it turns out you can't. Which, sucks to be you, because these are _amazing_. Damn. Why are they so good?"

"Paprika and garlic powder," Ignis tells him. He sighs and leans back in the overstuffed diner booth, the stiff white vinyl creaking under his shoulders. "A pity I've lost the ability to cook. It wouldn't be difficult to reproduce this for you."

"Wait, you can cook? Like, good cooking? This good kinda cooking?" Prompto asks.

"Before I was blinded. If I can be forgiven the boast, I was considered an extremely accomplished chef. Noct was a picky eater as a child, you understand, and _someone_ had to make sure he didn't perish of malnutrition before he reached adulthood, so I spent years learning how to smuggle vegetables into various roasts, soups, curries and such. Then I kept in practise even after his diet changed and he no longer needed such services. Habit, perhaps," Ignis murmurs. "Certainly there wasn't much point to it when Gladio prefers to survive off of Cup Noodles."

By now Prompto has figured out that Ignis isn't the type to exaggerate his own abilities. If he says he was 'an extremely accomplished chef' then he must have been making deep-fried ambrosia. "Smart and nice and badass, and _also_ a great chef? Is there anything about you that isn't amazing?"

The compliment sails right past Ignis to tangle in the blinds, hanging abandoned and awkward while Ignis tips his head back, slips his fingers beneath his shades to rub at scar tissue, scattering blue sparks. "Many things, I'm afraid."

Prompto focuses on licking spice and salt from his fingertips and definitely not on admiring that pale line of throat. "You still thinking of what that jerk Gladio said?"

"Listening, were you?"

"Kinda hard not to with the big guy doing such a great imitation of Titan the Earthshaker."

Ignis drops his hands to the tabletop and laces together his fingers. "Well, as inadequate as Gladio's skills at regulating volume may be, his assessment of both the situation and my actions are sound. He was right to be angry that I left the motel, right that I was likely the one who led Ardyn to Noctis . . . and right that I have burdened them with my presence."

"No way! Next you're gonna say you think he was right about you staying dead, which, uh, no. Nuh uh. That is total bullshit, dude. If you were gone who'd tuck Noctis into bed? No, I mean it," he says in the face of Ignis' incredulity. "The things you guys said in the car on the way here mean that Noct been chased outta Insomnia, right? That his home is gone, his whole vampire kingdom gone, and, uh. Family? Friends?"

" . . . the Lucis Caelums lived in Insomnia since the city's founding," says Ignis quietly. "Three generations of vampires and countless of their mortal kin have lived and died and been buried there, left their mark in the layout of streets, the rise of buildings, the web of electric lines. They built a wondrous home, a sprawling estate staffed by the living and the dead, where the select few could be sheltered and loved and gently guided into their next life," Ignis continues, painting in the images with his words until they fill the dinner booth:

The black lace of iron fences around a vast swath of grass plush and green as silk carpet; a parade of faceless men and women in black suits and shirts and shoes; a house —no, a mansion— three stories of mirrored glass and dark stone; the hive of shops downtown with the same logo discreetly pasted in a corner of each front window. And woven through it all are beautiful faces, pale skin and black hair, starry-blue eyes.

"Noctis loathed the estate. A 'gilded cage,' he called it. And yet . . . " The low creak of leather as Ignis' fingers tighten their weave. "We were out of touch two days. Two days, and everyone there . . . " Ignis shakes his head. "Yes, Noctis has lost both family and friends. And now a month later we've been driven from the city, and Noctis has lost his home and his heritage."

Prompto closes his eyes, breathes through his nose, and waits for the warbling notes from the radio scrub the memories from the air before he dares to look again.

When laments about broken down cars and moonshadow have moved into the notes of a chorus, Prompto clears his throat, says, "R-right. So. Pretty much everything he had is gone. Anyone who's lost so much needs some serious TLC, don't you think? Tucking him into bed is probably the least you can do." He stares into the bottom of his milkshake glass, at the dregs and the sludge. "When everyone else is gone and you're at your lowest . . . that's when stuff like that matters most."

When the killing-cold lack of it leaves you dying in slow stages, frostbite blackening the edges of your heart. When you turn to anything to fool yourself into feeling alive, like drugs or alcohol if you're old enough, rich enough. Videogames and junkfood if you're young, still trapped in the cage your parents built.

_Games. Is that why Noctis was at the arcade?_

The surge of hope Prompto feels at this possible kinship with Noctis is not something he's proud of, with its twisted delight at the thought of someone suffering like he did, someone empty like he was, someone hungry for noise and flashing lights to scream through the darkness inside and light it up with neon and adrenaline.

So he shoves away the thoughts along with him empty (self) glass. "Anyway," he says, "aren't you pretty much his only friend left? He wouldn't want to lose you. Not when you're the last of his, uh. Everything."

And for the first time Ignis looks _flustered_, turning his face away and reaching up to adjust his glasses, run his fingers through his hair, and again with the glasses, his lips parting with no words coming out even as his cheeks and the bridge of his nose are getting pinker with every second Prompto watches him. "I'm not- I can't be- there's Gladio as well."

"You said Gladio kept leaving," Prompto reminds him. "Doesn't sound like someone Noctis can count on right now." From here he can see the camper through the slats of the blinds, safety bars between himself and the monster den. Weird how Gladio might be human but acts way more the beast than Ignis, who's dead flesh and living flame. "Doesn't seem like much of a friend, either," he adds under his breath.

But Prompto should have known better than to try and slide any sullen mumbles past a blind dude.

Especially Ignis, who sheds his blushes like water off a chocobo, his back straightening and his expression growing stern. "Gladio _is_ a friend. I understand he didn't make the best of first impressions, Prompto, but Noctis is not the only one who has suffered. Gladio grew up on the estate as well, and his entire family was kept in residence. Most are dead. That a few are still missing is his only hope to hold onto, and that is fragile indeed. Likely he has been leaving to try and find any news."

"Oh. Man, now _I_ feel like a jerk."

"Don't. Gladiolus has always been abrasive, and his current attitude hardly invites sympathy. Only, try to make allowances for his temper. He's under great strain with his duty to Noctis and his love of his family pulling him in opposite directions, and he's prone to lashing out."

"Total dick move."

"Indeed," murmurs Ignis through another mirage of a smile. "Do feel free to give as good as you get."

"I~~~'ll leave that to you. Don't think the big guy would react too well to some 'twink off the street' talking back. You, uh. You think he's gonna come in here after us? He just left the camper." With his enormous frame browned by the sun, the stern scowl and the storm he calls a shadow, Gladio really does look like an avatar of Titan, risen to crush mouthy mortals.

But then he bends and picks up the plastic chair Prompto had tipped over, sets it next to the equally cheap plastic table, takes the time to straighten the other chairs, and it's not- It's not careless. It's not fussy, sure, but it's also not the kind of sloppy use of strength Prompto would expect from someone who lashed out at Ignis like that. Prompto would have imagined Gladio tossing the chairs roughly into place, not this neat arrangement.

"Most likely. He does need to eat mortal fare, and there aren't many other options available," says Ignis.

"What _is_ he?" whispers Prompto, slowly becoming entranced by the dance of inked feathers on dark skin, by the unexpected smile that breaks through the tough facade like a vein of glittering white quartz when Gladio turns toward the gas pumps. He raises his hand in lazy greeting. Prompto reads the name on Gladio's lips as he calls out. "Looks like he's going to talk to Cindy, by the way."

The easy way Gladio saunters over to Cindy makes jealousy snake in sour cramps through Prompto's guts, and he chews his lip at how close Gladio dares to stand. Tall as he is Gladio's _gotta_ be able to see right down the open front of Cindy's shirt (jerk) but she clearly doesn't realize it, giving him a wide grin bright and pretty as a sunrise (_jerk!_).

"Gladio? He's a ghoul. A human given regular doses of vampire blood. They become a bit faster, a bit stronger, and a great deal tougher. It comes at a price, of course."

"The collar?" From this angle Prompto can't see Gladio's face anymore, just the set of his shoulders and the cant of his hips, relaxed and open, even inviting, and though Prompto can't read the words from Gladio's mouth he can still see the haze of them hanging about the two, warm amber and sweet honey that leaves bright highlights in Cindy's golden hair. Is some of that from her? Is she into big, broad, brooding guys? Prompto's fit but he doesn't have a lot of bulk, so he'd have to-

". . . the _what?_" says Ignis, sharp enough to cut through Prompto's distraction.

"The red- um. Never mind," says Prompto with a guilty wince as his brain reviews what his tongue has let slip. It's reflex action against the expected (cold) disbelief, disdain, the questions he can't answer, the accusations of lies.

(the rejection, the rejection, the rejection)

Ignis' low hmmm rumbles in his chest, a cat's satisfied purr. "So you can see such bonds as well. I wonder . . . you might just be the trump card we need against Ardyn's puppets. Pity you're so untrained, but that can be remedied once we reach Tenebrae."

"I- what? It can? Wait, Tenebrae?" Something about the word when Ignis says it, the way he's tied threads of light to the syllables.

"It's our destination. Tell me." Ignis tips his head his head to the side. The reflections in his mirrored shades starts to ripple and drip. "Is Gladiolus headed this way?"

A quick glance out the window is enough to see that Gladio's abandoned Cindy and has turned toward the dinner. _Guess now that he's filled his flirting quota it's time to fill his face._ "Yeah, looks like it. He's gonna open the door right. about. now."

The cheerful jingle of the bells hung on the dinner's door ripples back on itself in disjointed echoes. On Ignis' face the world is made liquid. It melts and run, dripping down to pool on the sharp rise of his cheekbones, slides in silver lines down the curve of Ignis' cheek. "He'll be joining us for lunch, then."

The heavy tread of Gladio's boots on tile flooring chops the space into measured beats, forcing reality back into proper structure so that Ignis' glasses are just glasses, so that Ignis himself straightens again in his seat and puts on the polished mask of a lawyer, distant and cool and ready to flay skin with words alone.

Gladio doesn't look at them as he goes to order, his bored voice over-loud in the empty afternoon. He turns his back on Takka as the man works, in favour of scowling at the rest of the dinner, his arms crossed as he leans back against the countertop, glaring at the ketchup bottles and napkin dispensers, the radio crooning love ballads, the glint of sun on car windshields outside in the parking lot, the handful of customers unlucky enough to be breathing the same air.

Tension crawls over Prompto on spider legs, webs him in uncertainty, sinks its fangs into the last, feeble remnants of conversation and kills it, only to leave the corpse an awkward centrepiece on the table between him and Ignis, bleeding small-talk into the last of Prompto's fries.

_So much for doggybagging the leftovers. Gross._

"Order up!" sings Takka.

It's on a tray, because it's two servings of Takka's amazing hot sandwiches with the meat juicy and pink at its heart, a huge bowl of the chili fragrant with spices, a basket of fries still sizzling from the deep fryer, an enormous strawberry milkshake with water beading in crystal drops on its glass. Gladio pays, thick fingers peeling bills off a roll, and then he carries this work of culinary art over to their booth and sets it down on the table, carelessly shoving aside both dead conversation and the dregs of Prompto's lunch.

"Shove over, Freckles."

A quick glance at Ignis yields only Prompto's own face reflected back in mirrored shades, the eyes too wide, the skin pale under the flush of a young sunburn. With nothing to guide him but his own sense of survival all he can do is yield with a nervous, "Y-yeah. Sure."

He's soon crammed into the corner by the window. It's not enough. Gladio easily takes up enough space for two Promptos, and he's not shy about settling himself comfortably in the middle of the booth, spreading his legs so their thighs brush, the leather of Gladio's pants skin-warm through the fabric of Prompto's jeans. His shoulder, too, is close and warm, enough for Prompto to see the sweat trails in the dust hazing over that incredible tattoo.

He licks his lips.

Is it moving? Is it _living_? At first each feather seems picked out in detail so fine it might as well be the true thing, pressed against the skin from the inside, but the more Prompto looks, as only he can, the more the edges seem to blur and unravel, fine lines growing lines growing angles and whorls until it's _writing_, endless reels of words strung end to end in an enormous picture of-

"Cindy'll swap out the car," says Gladio around a mouthful of roasted meat. "Get us something that the cops won't be looking for. You figure out where we'll be driving it?"

Ignis raises an eyebrow, a wordless motion that says all kinds of things about about how everyone here has noticed Gladio's lack of apology, that they all know Gladio's pretending not to notice them noticing, and that Ignis is super generous and willing to let it slide. "Tenebrae. And it's not 'we', it's Prompto. He'll be doing most of the driving. I want your hands free in case we get pulled over."

Gladio's grunt is as articulate as Ignis' eyebrows, a mix of approval (for Ignis) and doubt (for Prompto, always for Prompto) that muddies the air around them. And for a while Gladio lets that mess hang there, a brown fog that roils with sullen resentment and brooding scepticism and acidic distrust that makes Prompto itch, itch, _itch_ until he's seriously considering climbing over and across the table so he can crawl away and lick the blistered skin of his soul.

Except that across the table is Ignis, a monument to immovable objects, buttressed by silent expectation thick as stone walls. It keeps Prompto fenced in here, stuck in his cramped little corner while- Okay, so Gladio doesn't so much eat as he _consumes_, strong white teeth cutting into bread and meat with the relentless pace of a machine, grinding up and swallowing down first one sandwich, then the other, while Prompto has to sit and watch that throat work under the tight band of scarlet that always threatens to spill and drip but never does.

He can see it. He wonders if he can touch it. He wonders if he could slip his fingers under it, feel the pulse of Gladio's heartbeat, tug and lead the man around. His fingers twitch and he looks away, and realizes that the cloud is fading. With every mouthful, every swipe of tongue and flash of teeth, the air clears a little more, Gladio swallowing everything down until he's got nothing but his chili left, and when he starts to spoon himself his first taste he finally breaks the silence.

"So. Prompto, right? You can drive. What else?"

What else? Does Prompto _need_ anything else? Is this an interview? He's only ever had two of those and something tells him that Gladio's going to be considerably less impressed by the photography trivia that got Prompto the job at the Passport Palace. He can't change his clothes but maybe he should go wash his hands and do his hair and climb out the washroom window to escape?

Gladio doesn't bother to look up from his food as digs his elbow into Prompto's side. Not hard though, more impatient than anything, and he says, "C'mon, kid. We're about to go on a road trip through three countries to escape from an immortal psychopath who thinks he's _funny_. What else can you do?"

Caught off guard, nothing but truth comes out. "I can run away real good? I, uh. Jog every morning."

He's expecting a verbal jab to follow up the elbow one. Instead Gladio actually looks pleased. "Huh. So you've got enough sense to do that, at least. Good. That'll keep you alive longer than any would-be badass bullshit."

"You _care_?" blurts Prompto, then immediately wishes he could swallow his own tongue when he sees the careful way that Gladio goes still to hide the flinch, the scar on his face slitting open to bleed regret.

Gladio tells his chili bowl, "I _care_. About keeping as many of us alive as possible. That's my job. The purpose I was _made_ for," he continues, his words flavoured salt and bitter, bitter, _bitter_. "I'm a bodyguard, a shield for our Sleeping Beauty sacked out in the camper right now." He stirs his chili, glaring at whatever he sees in those red-mud depths. "I'm _also_ responsible for the general security of his retinue. Which would be me, Ignis, and now you. That's why I need to know what you can do: so I can decide how much I gotta babysit your ass. Last thing we want is the cops coming after us for ditching a corpse."

Ignis clears his throat.

". . . and I've got a sister about your age," Gladio admits. "Be a shame to see you get splattered across the landscape."

The glittering razored wire strung across this new-found gap in Gladio's armour convinces Prompto to take the long way around to getting to know his latest travelling buddy. "I've lived alone for a while now, so I can do basic stuff like cooking and cleaning," he offers, figuring that if running away is a skill, maybe making toast and eggs counts, too. "I can do basic stuff like change out tires and some sewing. I can climb pretty good. Um, parkour? And, so, like. _Maybe_ I can also sorta pick locks," he admits, willing to throw himself into this since it's not there's any escape if Noct is to be believed. "Not anything complicated or high tech? Just. Enough to get into places people don't go anymore so I can snap a few shots. Oh yeah, I can take photos! . . . if I have a camera. Or even a phone."

"You did urban exploration?" Laughter jiggles the consonants in Ignis' voice. "Perhaps I should have asked you to unlock the car for us."

"Hey, woah! I'm a photographer, not a thief! No way I would do a car door."

"Would is not the question, but _could_," corrects the Evil Lawyer Ignis.

"I am not even gonna go there with you, dude. You'd probably be able to convince me I time travelled back a few centuries and murdered King Salis. Which I guess brings us to the 'weird power' segment of this Prompto exposé." He fidgets with his wristband and wishes he had his own bowl of chili to stare into. Except maybe not, because, "I can. Uh. See stuff." And there's no telling what he'd see if he really looked into Takka's chili, is there?

"'Stuff'," Gladio says.

"Stuff," agrees Prompto. Really, what else is he supposed to call the footprints that lead into bathroom stalls and don't come out, the scratch marks on the other side of mirrors, the empty city lots with glass castles at their hearts, the tear-tracks on the faces of cut flowers and the advice columns that says nothing but 'die, die, die, die, die.'

"What, you mean like ghosts?"

"No. Just. Stuff. It's kinda like," Prompto waves his hands, trying to sketch the outline of his world with finger wiggles, "visual noise? Like someone graffitied over the whole world. Mostly it's meaningless, but sometimes it's actually useful. It's how I got us away from the shooters."

"His guidance is what allowed both Noctis and I to escape Ardyn' thralls untouched," puts in Defence Lawyer Ignis (probably still Evil though.)

"Huh." Gladio chews on that along with the last of his chili, first letting the idea linger on his tongue, then licking it from his lips, from the silver curve of his spoon.

That spoon drops into the empty bowl, its ringing clatter a herald to Galdio's judgement. "You're staying. I ain't happy about it, but we can use the extra help at this point. _Not_ with protecting His Highness, though. That's my job. You don't get in the way of that, and you especially don't try to help unless I ask. Instead, you look after Iggy."

Ignis' head snaps up. "Gladio . . . " he says, tone threatening mayhem and litigation.

But Gladio continues to plough ahead. "You don't leave his side, ever. You make sure he doesn't walk into any walls, fall down any holes, or get shot by any of Ardyn's puppets. And if I tell you to get him under cover, you do it. You fucking _drag_ him if you have to."

"Gladio!" snarls Ignis in a voice of flame, fingers of blue fire groping at the edges of his mirrored shades, and Prompto grips the ends of the table, swallows, prays to Shiva. His soul is still tender with blisters from Ignis' earlier rage - he doesn't think he can take the full blast from this close.

"Take him or leave us, Iggy," snaps Gladio. "You know you can't fight anymore. You want to stay, fine, but you're fucking blind now, and you've gotta accept what that means: someone has to do the seeing for you. Since Prompto's already proven he can keep you in one piece he might as well keep doing it, and if he's got magic eyeballs, all the better." A last dig, "You’re doing 'everything you can to compensate', right?"

The sharp lines of Ignis' brows dip, the only part of his face to move. Impressive, considering the blazing sapphire corona that swirls about his head, raking claws through his hair and pawing at his face. More impressive? What actually comes out of his mouth is nothing but a cool, calm, ". . . very well."

Relief is a cascade of ice down Prompto's spine. He shudders, feels dizzy, his hands and feet too cold. "_Thank_ you," he praises the Glacian. Then at Gladio's puzzled frown, quickly covers up his desperate prayers with, "For, uh. Trusting me! With Iggy. Thanks for that."

The cold is really not a problem now that embarrassment is burning across his face, the back of his neck. And for a horrible moment he thinks he's blown it (already, always) as Gladio stares at him, brown-gold animal eyes narrowed and fierce.

Then Gladio glances at Ignis, back and Prompto, back at Ignis, and when he looks at Prompto that third time there's something new, his eyebrows starting to rise and is that- yup, it is something _suspiciously_ like a smile tugging at the corners of Gladio's mouth. Just what is he thinking?!

(just what does he know?!)

"At least you're motivated to keep him safe. Which is more than I can say for Iggy himself," says Gladio, apparently immune to the smouldering dregs of anger drifting across the table from Ignis like a volcanic plume, the last gasp of his temper before it flicker-dies to sullen embers of irritation.

Ignis sighs. "If you are quite finished."

Gladio smirks and settles back against the booth, the old vinyl groaning protest. "Not anywhere close. But you can shut me up for now by laying out the plan. You _do_ have one, right, Master Strategist?"

"The plan," Ignis says, and it's no longer fire but clear blue light that pours from him in a gush, a fountain, a geyser - the pure, steady light of intellect. True brilliance.

It arrows out of him in rays that braid together, weave and join and in an instant he has become the centre of a web vast and glittering, Prompto and Gladio, and Noctis and a golden-pale woman, too, all of them tangled in the weft, and there is Tenebrae hanging by the same shining threads as before, and flashes of a man-creature-monster that melts and oozes with smiles, talking, endlessly talking, and his words are spun away to knot in the glowing ropes Ignis has strung and Ignis says,

"We're going to Tenebrae to consult the Oracle as to how one kills an immortal."

~

The car Cindy has given them is a dusty grey that darkens to charcoal in the twilight, the rust at the edges of its doors a sick black mottle. Prompto slides in behind the wheel and starts adjusting the seat so his legs can reach the pedals, the steering wheel so it's not at his chin, the mirrors to make sure he can't look into them. He kinda wishes he could do something about the smell of cigarettes and wilted flowers.

"Cindy says the plates are legit," reports Gladio as he folds himself into the seat behind Prompto. "So we shouldn't have any problems crossing borders. You _sure_ this is a good idea, Iggy?" It's the fourth time he's asked. "The Oracle's nuts. She once said dogs are messengers of the Astrals."

"A claim that has yet to be disproved," Ignis replies absently, settling into the shotgun seat. "Did you check the camper for anything you might have forgotten, Noct?"

"_Yes_," is the groaning answer. "I checked _twice_, okay? Shove over, Gladio."

"Make me, Princess."

The car rocks as the pair wrestle for territory. Prompto turns the key, and the engine sputters and finally turns over. "Maybe that's why all dogs are good dogs," he offers. He puts the car in gear, and they slowly drive out of Hammerhead's parking lot, following the guide of the yellow arrow that points them toward destiny.

"Divine blessing?" muses Ignis.

"Dog spelt backward is god," Prompto reminds him.

Noct says, "You'll like Luna. The Oracle, I mean. She's nice. Dad took me to meet her when I was a kid."

"You think?" asks Prompto, and finds himself actually hopeful, actually believing there's a chance. It's strange and it's scary, to find himself in a little car driving off into a big world, with three no-longer-strangers not-yet-friends. It makes the night's deepening darkness seem bright with possibilities.

(they stud the sky ahead like stars)

\- END


End file.
